Latest news with #Tigar
San Francisco Chronicle
12 hours ago
- Politics
- San Francisco Chronicle
Judge blocks Trump order cutting federal funds to LGBTQ nonprofits
President Donald Trump's war on 'DEI' — programs promoting diversity, equity and inclusion — suffered a setback Monday in a Bay Area federal court, where a judge blocked attempts to cut off federal funding to nine nonprofits serving the LGBTQ community unless they changed their practices and their vocabulary. 'These provisions seek to strip funding from programs that serve historically disenfranchised populations,' U.S. District Judge Jon Tigar of Oakland said in a ruling requiring continued funding of the Los Angeles LGBT Center, San Francisco AIDS Foundation and other organizations across the country while the case continues. It does not apply to other groups affected by Trump's orders. Those orders require federally funded programs to halt any 'equity-related grants or contracts' and 'programs promoting DEI,' apparently barring any aid to racial, ethnic or gender minorities. Another provision orders them to cut off funding for programs that 'promote gender ideology.' That would mean denying 'the very existence of transgender people,' Joe Hollendoner, executive director of the Los Angeles LGBT Center, said in a filing with the court. 'While the Executive requires some degree of freedom to implement its political agenda, it is still bound by the Constitution,' Tigar, appointed to the bench by President Barack Obama, said in his ruling. That means the administration 'cannot weaponize Congressionally appropriated funds to single out protected communities or suppress ideas that it does not like,' he said. A lawyer for the nonprofits, Jose Abrigo of Lambda Legal, said the ruling halts Trump administration orders 'that seek to erase transgender people from public life, dismantle DEI efforts, and silence nonprofits delivering life-saving services.' 'These policies threatened to erase access to lifesaving HIV and health services for transgender, nonbinary, and queer people across the country,' said Dr. Tyler TerMeer, chief executive officer of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. 'The Court's action gives us the fuel to keep fighting.' Trump's Justice Department argued that transgender advocacy groups, and not the administration, were the ones violating civil rights by allowing people who were born male to compete with female athletes, use women's restrooms and identify themselves as female. Trump is entitled to 'align government funding and enforcement strategies with (his) policy priorities,' Justice Department attorney Pardis Ghelbi said in a filing asking Tigar to dismiss the lawsuit. But the judge said Monday that the administration's explicit goals — including the denial of transgender people's existence — were 'facially discriminatory' and 'not a legitimate government interest.' Trump's orders require federally funded organizations 'who provide specialized services to transgender persons to remove references to those persons — as well as the characteristics that caused those persons to need the services in the first place,' Tigar said. 'It is as difficult to imagine how this would work as it is to imagine a pediatrician not acknowledging the existence of children, or a gerontologist denying the existence of the elderly.'
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Skeptical California federal judge grills Trump DOJ over anti-trans & anti-DEI orders
A federal judge in California expressed sharp skepticism Thursday as the Trump administration defended executive orders that LGBTQ+ advocates say censor speech and threaten life-saving services. Keep up with the latest in + news and politics. In San Francisco A.I.D.S. Foundation v. Trump, U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar heard arguments from Lambda Legal and the Department of Justice over three executive orders targeting so-called 'gender ideology' and diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. The plaintiffs, a coalition of nine LGBTQ+ and HIV-focused nonprofits, are asking a judge to issue an injunction to halt enforcement. 'To me, that sounds incredibly vague,' Tigar told DOJ attorney Pardis Gheibi, according to Courthouse News Service, after she declined to clearly define what counts as 'gender ideology.' Under questioning, Gheibi admitted that asking a client their pronouns or providing all-gender restrooms could violate the orders if federally funded. The lawsuit stems from a series of executive orders signed by President Donald Trump during his first week back in office this January. Among them was Executive Order 14168, titled 'Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism,' which mandates that the federal government recognize only two sexes—male and female—and prohibits federal grantees from affirming transgender identities. Two additional orders dismantled DEI grant programs and barred federally funded entities from applying 'equity-based' hiring, education, and health care practices. LGBTQ+ organizations immediately warned that the moves were designed to erase trans people from public life. Related: San Francisco AIDS Foundation and other LGBTQ+ groups bring new lawsuit against anti-trans executive orders Lambda Legal's Camilla Taylor argued the orders violate the First Amendment by chilling protected speech and the Fifth Amendment by targeting transgender people. 'Even if what plaintiffs are doing is promoting unlawful DEI activities, that is protected First Amendment activity—unless it rises to incitement,' she said, according to the Bay Area Reporter. San Francisco AIDS Foundation CEO Dr. Tyler TerMeer told The Advocate earlier this year that the orders had created panic among clients, with some fearing the loss of housing, HRT, or HIV medications. 'For us, the only option was to fight,' he said. Tigar did not rule from the bench. 'Nothing I say indicates how I will rule,' he said, per Courthouse News. A written decision is expected in the coming weeks.
San Francisco Chronicle
23-04-2025
- Politics
- San Francisco Chronicle
Ninth Circuit reinstates S.F. sheriff program that allows warrantless searches
San Francisco sheriff's officers can conduct warrantless searches of criminal defendants who have been released while awaiting trial, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday, reversing a judge's decision that the search orders exceed the sheriff's authority and violate the right to privacy. The search requirements are reasonable safety measures and do not intrude on a judge's authority to order pretrial release, said the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The court said another of the sheriff's mandates, allowing his office to inform law enforcement agencies elsewhere of a defendant's location, 'helps law enforcement solve crimes quickly both in San Francisco and neighboring jurisdictions.' The 2-1 ruling was written by Judge Jay Bybee and joined by Judge Carlos Bea, both appointees of President George W. Bush. In dissent, Judge Salvador Mendoza, appointed by President Joe Biden, said the orders reinstated by the court 'infringe upon Californians' fundamental right to pretrial liberty.' Under the rules set by the sheriff's office, once a Superior Court judge decides that someone charged with a crime can be freed before trial, the defendant must agree to allow officers to search his or her body, vehicle, home and property at any time during release, and to have their location shared with other agencies. U.S. District Judge Jon Tigar halted the searches in February 2024, saying they threatened 'enormous intrusions on personal privacy' and that challengers to the orders were likely to prove that such conditions on release must be approved by a judge rather than imposed by the sheriff's office. Tigar was appointed to the court by President Barack Obama. In September, Tigar ruled that Sheriff Paul Miyamoto's office had repeatedly violated his injunction by refusing to release defendants who would not agree to warrantless searches, and said Miyamoto and other city officials could be held in contempt of court unless they changed their practices. Miyamoto responded in October by cutting off new enrollments to his office's ankle-monitoring program, which allows some defendants to be freed before trial if they wore devices allowing their locations to be tracked electronically. The cutoff did not affect those already in the program. In Wednesday's ruling, the appeals court said allowing sheriff's officers to decide when a defendant should be searched while on pretrial release does not interfere with a judge's authority to decide who should be set free. 'The courts have full control over the individualized determination to release or not release a defendant, specifying which programs to offer, and the conditions the defendant will be subject to while on release,' Bybee wrote. But, he added, 'the courts must accept that (the San Francisco Sheriff's Office) will have its own view of the on-the-ground realities of the programs it is willing or able to supervise.' Mendoza, in dissent, said Tigar had examined the evidence and found that the sheriff's search requirements interfered with a local judge's determination of the proper conditions of pretrial release. 'Allowing the executive branch — who prosecutes criminal cases — to impose conditions of release is to let the catcher call balls and strikes,' Mendoza wrote. Alex Barrett-Shorter, spokesperson for City Attorney David Chiu, said the ruling was 'a victory for an important program that allows criminal defendants often facing serious, violent felony charges to be released from jail before trial while protecting the public and crime victims through intensive supervision.' American Civil Liberties Union attorney Shilpi Agarwal, who represented defendants challenging the sheriff's search requirements, said they would appeal the ruling. They could ask the full appeals court to order a new hearing before a larger panel. 'We disagree with the majority's opinion and maintain that the San Francisco Sheriff's Office exceeded its authority by intruding on the privacy of people released pretrial on electronic monitoring,' Agarwal said.
